Richard Posner gives a history of "the intellectual decline of conservatism" from the '60s to now.

In this blog post (which is woefully in need of paragraph breaks).

Here's his assessment of where it's ended up:

[T]he policies of the new conservatism are powered largely by emotion and religion and have for the most part weak intellectual groundings. That the policies are weak in conception, have largely failed in execution, and are political flops is therefore unsurprising. The major blows to conservatism, culminating in the election and programs of Obama, have been fourfold: the failure of military force to achieve U.S. foreign policy objectives; the inanity of trying to substitute will for intellect, as in the denial of global warming, the use of religious criteria in the selection of public officials, the neglect of management and expertise in government; a continued preoccupation with abortion; and fiscal incontinence in the form of massive budget deficits, the Medicare drug plan, excessive foreign borrowing, and asset-price inflation.

Posner's post helps clarify the disconnect between (1) the fact that he's typically labeled a "conservative" and (2) what he actually says about the issues.